Murder Packs a Suitcase (13 page)

“What about Patrice?” she asked. “What happened to her business?”

“Frankly, I don't remember. She might have sold it to somebody else who wanted to swirl ice cream into cones all day. Or maybe a developer bought it, knocked it down, and crammed a hundred condos on the land.”

“Where is she these days? Still in Orlando?” Realizing she didn't want to sound as if she was giving him the third degree, she added, “I wonder what kind of job somebody gets after giving up on the ice-cream business.”

“Oh, she's long gone,” Desmond replied. “She got out of here a couple of years after the divorce. She went up to Chicago, I think. Of course, that was ages ago. Lord knows where she is now.”

Too bad, Mallory thought. Picking her brain might have been helpful.

Suddenly Desmond sighed. “I should really get back to work,” he said, glancing around the ballroom as if the mere sight of it was almost too distressing to bear. “I just wanted to check and see if the cops had taken down this horrid crime-scene tape yet. I can't wait to turn this jewel of a ballroom back into an active part of the hotel. I've got a twenty-fifth-anniversary party scheduled for Saturday night and a Sweet Sixteen on Sunday. Keep your fingers crossed that they won't end up canceling, too, just like everybody else.”

As she headed back to her room, Mallory pondered what Desmond had told her. He certainly made no bones about his dislike for Phil Diamond. Still, he seemed so matter-of-fact about their failed business venture, it was hard to believe that seeking revenge had ever been on his agenda.

Yet there was no reason for him to have been completely honest with her concerning either his past interactions with Phil Diamond or his current feelings about the man. And she had seen him destroy evidence with her own eyes. While his actions could have simply been the result of his fastidiousness, it was equally possible he'd been trying to cover something up.

She knew that if she wanted to get her name off Detective Martinez's list of suspects, she would have to do whatever she could to find out. In the meantime, however, the gnawing in the pit of her stomach reminded her that she was about to face something that was almost as traumatic as finding Phil Diamond's body floating at the base of the Gitgit Waterfall: her first date in more than twenty years.

9

“I can't think of anything that excites a greater sense of childlike wonder than to be in a country where you are ignorant of almost everything.”

—Bill Bryson

T
en minutes later, Mallory stood in front of her hotel room closet, taking deep breaths in a fruitless attempt to calm herself.

Why on earth did I ever agree to let Wade come with me tonight? she thought. None of the clothes she'd brought seemed appropriate. The pink linen blouse that had looked perfectly fine at home suddenly struck her as boring. Her silky black shirt not only seemed too bare, she suddenly remembered that it was a little tight around the arms.

It occurred to her that her main problem was that she had no idea about the proper dress code for an evening of yo-ho-ho'ing with a shipload of pirates.

Or maybe it wasn't the pirates' opinion that she was concerned about.

With a defeated sigh, she reached for her dependable beige linen go-everywhere dress, reminding herself that its primary virtue was that it could be dressed up or down with the right jewelry. She had just slipped it on and was studying her upper arms in the mirror, agonizing over whether they were too plump to be seen in public, when her cell phone trilled.

Great, she thought, making a mad dash for her purse. Somehow Wade got hold of my cell phone number and he's calling to cancel. He finally realized he has absolutely no interest in spending an entire evening with a boring, middle-aged woman who hasn't been called upon to hold up her end of a serious adult conversation in months.
Especially
a serious adult conversation with a member of the opposite sex.

So she was surprised that her home number was flashing on the screen.

“Jordan?” she answered breathlessly, afraid that something was wrong. “Amanda? Is everything okay?”

“Of course,” her daughter returned calmly. “Everything is fine, Mother. It's you I'm worried about. Are you all right?”

“Of course I'm all right,” Mallory replied.

She remembered that it was her life, and not her children's, that was suddenly in turmoil. Yet she hoped her daughter had been so tuned in to her own personal crisis that she hadn't bothered to tune in to any news media.

Trying to sound casual, she added, “Why wouldn't I be?”

“Because you're in a brand-new place, doing a brand-new job,” Amanda replied matter-of-factly. “Because you don't know a soul down in Florida. Because you're staying at a hotel all by yourself, sleeping alone in a strange bed. Because this is practically the first time you've left Rivington since Daddy died.”

Even though she was greatly relieved that her daughter clearly didn't know a thing about Phil Diamond's murder, Amanda's list of Five Good Reasons to Feel Anxious still gave Mallory pause. Each one was completely true. Yet out of all of them, the only one that made her stop and think was the last.

And the sole reason was that her daughter had called her at the exact moment she'd been agonizing over what to wear on something that sounded an awful lot like a date. For the first time since before her wedding day, she'd been getting ready to spend an entire evening with a man who wasn't either her husband, a co-worker, or a dentist about to perform a particularly long procedure on her. And trying to come up with ways to look good while doing it.

“I'm fine,” Mallory assured her daughter. “Orlando is like a big playground. You couldn't get into trouble if you tried.”

“How about the other journalists on the trip?” Amanda asked. “Are you getting along with them?”

“All the writers are very nice.” Except for the one who's very dead, she thought. But since Amanda obviously hadn't heard about it, she certainly wasn't going to be the one to give her one more thing to worry about. At least not unless she found out about it in the news, like her editor had. “And we're in very good hands,” she continued. “A lovely young woman from the Florida Tourism Board has been taking good care of us. So has the general manager of the hotel.”

“That's a relief,” Amanda replied. “I've been so worried about you being down there all alone.”

“How about you?” Mallory asked, a bit irritated by her daughter's concern over her ability to function on her own. “Any new developments?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact. Today I had a long conversation with Mr. James. Do you remember him? He was my favorite history teacher in high school. We had a long talk about my future. I really wanted his input, since he's someone who knows me well.”

“What was his advice?”

“To follow in Daddy's footsteps. Mr. James feels I have the verbal skills and the mental agility required to be an excellent lawyer.”

“Then you've made your decision—and you're ready to go back to school?” Mallory asked hopefully.

“Not yet. Tomorrow I'm going to see if I can track down my Girl Scout leader. I seem to remember that one year I sold more cookies than anyone in our troop's history.”

Which clearly puts you in the running to be the next Bill Gates, Mallory thought.

Aloud, she said, “How is Jordan doing?”

Amanda sighed. “What does it take to get that boy off the couch?”

“Remind him that tomorrow is recycling day,” she suggested. “Dragging the pail out to the street is about the only exercise he gets these days.”

“I will. But tell me more about this press trip,” Amanda urged. “Do all the writers do everything together, like on one of those European tours that covers eight countries in fifteen days?”

“Actually, we're all interested in seeing different things,” Mallory explained, still peering at her arms in the mirror. “But Courtney—she's the woman from the tourist board—came with me to the
Titanic
museum. And one of the other writers who specializes in travel for senior citizens tagged along when I went to a reptile preserve called Gatorland.”

“I'm so glad you're making new friends!” Amanda sounded like the proud mother of a kindergartner. “What about meals? Please don't tell me you're eating alone tonight.”

“Actually,” Mallory replied, doing her best to sound nonchalant, “I'm going to a dinner show with a…a new friend.”

“A friend?” Amanda sounded suspicious. Or at least confused. “What do you mean? Is this someone you met in Florida?”

“It's one of the other journalists.”

“How nice! What magazine does she write for?”

“It's not a she.”

After a long silence, Amanda croaked, “You have a
date
?”

“It's not exactly a date,” Mallory insisted. “Like I said, I'm simply having dinner with one of the other writers on the trip. We're just friends.”

The silence at the other end of the line seemed to last an eternity. Mallory was beginning to wonder if the capricious technology behind cell phones had failed.

But then Amanda said, “Mother, I think that's wonderful. That you're spending time with a man, I mean.”

The girl was full of surprises. “You do?”

“Yes, I do. It's important for you to make all kinds of new friends—including male friends. Platonic relationships with members of the opposite sex can play a very important role in building a person's self-esteem.”

Mallory was contemplating whether or not to say that she wasn't so sure Wade belonged in the platonic category when Amanda instructed, “Now, I want you to do your best to have a good time tonight. And remember: You're a very interesting person with a lot of worthwhile things to say. You can do this. There's absolutely no reason to be nervous.”

Just hearing the word
nervous
sent Mallory into a tizzy. She was suddenly back to obsessing over the presentability of her arms, her collection of inappropriate outfits, a platonic relationship versus the almost unimaginable alternative…. By the time she hung up, she was completely convinced she'd made a mistake in agreeing to have dinner with Wade, even if scores of pirates would be serving as her chaperones.

But it was too late. There was nothing for her to do but try to have a good time. Even if it did mean she would actually be following her daughter's advice.

As Mallory strolled through the front door of the Pirate's Dinner Adventure with Wade at her side, she told herself she'd been silly to think of the evening ahead as a date. How could it be anything that serious when the restaurant's male employees wore shirts with puffed sleeves and a wooden treasure chest brimming over with gold doubloons was protected by nothing more ominous than a big
DO NOT TOUCH
sign?

As soon as they exchanged their vouchers for purple tickets, a wench wearing a flimsy off-the-shoulder blouse and too much eyeliner approached them.

“Step over here, please,” she instructed, making it clear they had no choice. “We're going to take a photo of you with Captain Morgan.”

“Captain Morgan?” Wade repeated as they shuffled into position next to a life-size statue of a grinning pirate. “Shouldn't he be home making rum?”

“Stand closer,” the pirate who doubled as a photographer insisted. “No, not closer to Captain Morgan. Closer to each other.” He frowned. “Why don't you try putting your arms around each other so you look like a couple?”

Mallory opened her mouth to explain that they weren't a couple. But this pirate didn't look as if he'd be interested. Not with a long line of people waiting to be photographed standing next to a shiny, fake-looking pirate who appeared to have been manufactured in the same factory as Ronald McDonald.

“These guys are pirates,” Wade said, draping one arm around her shoulders and the other around Captain Morgan. “We'd be wise to do whatever they say.”

He pulled her close enough that they undoubtedly looked like a bona fide couple. It's not a date, it's not a date, she repeated in her head over and over again. Still, she could feel her cheeks burning. She only hoped the lighting wasn't good enough to capture how red her face was undoubtedly turning.

After the requisite photo op, Mallory and Wade wandered through the spacious room that all the guests had been corralled into. Wenches were serving up hors d'oeuvres, bartenders were pouring dangerously large drinks, and face painters and tarot card readers were trying to lure children into spending a little more of their parents' money. The various shops lining the walls made the interior look like a Caribbean town, although the fact that there was a huge bar in the center instead of a village square detracted from the effect somewhat. A dock that jutted far out into the room looked as if it doubled as a stage.

“This part of the evening is called the King's Festival,” Mallory explained. “I read that in the brochure.”

“The king is clearly a capitalist,” Wade noted, glancing around. “Face painting, a fortune-teller…and look! There's Johnny Depp!”

He pointed to a life-size cardboard cutout of Johnny Depp wearing his Jack Sparrow costume. It was a shameless salute to the
Pirates of the Caribbean
movies, one more vehicle that perpetuated the image of pirates as a bunch of fun-loving, rum-drinking, stunt-performing dudes who occasionally indulged in a bit of harmless pillaging and plundering. The two-dimensional pirate stood outside a shop that sold the usual assortment of pirate paraphernalia: shot glasses emblazoned with pictures of pirates, plastic skull-and-crossbones refrigerator magnets, and eye patches, bandannas, swords, pistols, and everything else a person would need to launch a career in the lucrative pirate industry.

“Look at this place!” Wade exclaimed. “It reminds me of the last bar mitzvah I went to.”

“Except for the three bars,” Mallory commented.

“Right. There were at least six at the bar mitzvah.”

She laughed. This is fun, she thought.
He's
fun.

Once they'd waited in line for appetizers and bought rum-based drinks at the bar, Wade asked breezily, “So, tell me, Ms. Marlowe, how did such a talented investigative reporter ever get involved in travel writing?”

Mallory stiffened. His tone was definitely flirtatious, she decided. She was relieved that one of the pirates on staff chose that particular moment to leap onto the dock and grab a microphone.

“I am Frederick the Town Crier,” he boomed, “and tonight is special, because Princess Anita is visiting the citizens of Port Santa Cruz de Timucuan….”

“I didn't realize they had such outstanding sound systems in the 1600s,” Wade whispered.

“But we must beware of Captain Sebastian the Black,” Frederick continued. “He is the cruelest of pirates and has vowed to kidnap her….”

Mallory was relieved that there was little opportunity for conversation as, one by one, the rest of the cast members joined Frederick onstage. Princess Anita was dressed in a long dress that resembled a wedding gown. Since she was wearing white, she was clearly one of the good guys. As for the redheaded wench who sashayed onto the stage as if she owned the joint, she wore a black leather bustier and a red skirt that was split up the front. Her risqué outfit made it clear she was one of the bad guys.